I am in post production at the moment on a video I am hoping will be accepted as an Arcast episode. This is my first significant video editing experience, so I have had a lot of hurdles, and challenges to figure out. But this post isn’t about the horrible state of video editing software in the world right now (how anyone expects a normal consumer to do any of this is beyond me!).

I had a spare clip that was shot while we were doing a sound test. Jim Holmes and Philip Jordan just started gabbing. I thought this would be a good excuse to try out Silverlight streaming (while waiting 5.5 hours for the real video to render).

What is Silverlight Streaming? It is a new service off of live.com. You can go to http://silverlight.live.com to get all of the official details. Microsoft gives you up to 10GB of storage space, and up to 5TB of bandwidth! You simply login, and create an account.

Once you have an account, you can upload videos or music for online storage. You will be given a streaming ID (which is a public key), and a secret key for your own use, so you can secure your content.

You can then send links to those clips directly, or you can embed them in your web site, blog, etc. The Silverlight player will start streaming the video. Currently, no ads, bugs, or logos will be added onto your content. Later this year they will release an upgrade that allows you to generate ad revenue, just like AdCenter on your web site.

When you log into your account, you will see this menu.

If you click on the Manage Applications menu item, you will see where you can upload your own Silverlight application. This will let you have Microsoft host your application. The Silverlight Streaming system uses Microsoft’s global content network, so it’s reliable, fast, and always up.

Notice that it also shows you how much space you have available in your account.

I wanted to simply host a short video, so I clicked on Manage Videos. It list the videos I have uploaded, as well as some simple viewing statistics.

If I select a video, I will see a preview, some HTML code to embed it into a web site or blog, and a simple URL to send to people.

That’s it. It was really easy for me to do this. I didn’t have to ‘figure’ anything out. A lot easier than figuring out how to edit, and render video.

Amanada Laucher (and others) are putting together a coach bus from Grand Rapids, Michigan, all the way down to Nashville and back for DevLink. There will be plenty of stops along the way to pick up more people. Check out the post to see the route they will take.

Years ago, before I joined MS, we did a similar bus from Columbus to Detroit for the VS2005 launch. It was a blast, and that was with only 16 people. We had video games, video interviews, wifi with Internet, DVD players, and a Russian driver that wasn’t afraid of the speed limit.

They are looking for sponsors to make the bus easy. Microsoft is sponsoring the bus, but they need more!

If you want to go to DevLink, but thought it was too far, now is your chance.

CodeStock is a new local event in Knoxville, TN being put on by the community leaders in the area. Save the date on your calendar, and check out the site.

CodeStock's mission is to bring the best and brightest code experts to East Tennessee for a one day conference open to all developers. This is not a trade show with slick salesman giving prepared demos - this is a gathering of real programmers learning about the latest in technology from each other.

If you would like to speak at CodeStock, go to http://www.codestock.org/Pages/Speakers.aspx and put in your submission. We’re looking for talks in all areas of software development, including .NET, RIA, Web, AJAX, Databases, and other. This will be a great opportunity for you to speak and to show your knowledge to the community.

They plan on revealing major details next Tuesday on June 17th, so stay tuned.

Microsoft will be a Platinum sponsor.

I plan on being there and presenting my Soft Skillz talk. It will be hard to not make Woodstock comments all day long.

I will be speaking to a whole bunch of students at ITT in Nashville, TN this Friday (June 13th) at 6:00pm. Contact me if you want to attend. I will be covering my Soft Skillz talk, focusing on the career management aspects of it.

I will be presenting this Tuesday (June 10th, 2008) at the Bennett Adelson .NET SIG in Cleveland.

Summary:

.NET 3.5 SP1 and VS 2008 SP1 are on track to be released this summer. In this presentation, Brian will cover a lap around the new frameworks, and features it includes. These servicing updates provide a roll-up of bug fixes and performance improvements for issues reported since Microsoft released the products last November. They also contain a number of feature additions and enhancements that make building .NET applications better. This includes ASP.NET Dynamic Data, ASP.NET Routing Engine, ASP.NET AJAX Back/Forward Button Support, ADO.NET Entity Framework, and LINQ to Entities, and ADO.NET Data Services.

If you sign up and say which user group you are a part of (regardless of type, so .NET, java, agile, etc.) then he will give you a 10% discount, and donate 5% to your user group. Now that is community support! I would love to see more vendors do that.

If you go, just don't mention Vista Speech APIs or tablets. You will derail him for hours. :)

The first episode was an introductory cast. The second podcast was recorded at the MVP summit, in the lobby bar of the W. It was a lot of fun. We tried to discuss interviewing war stories, and related advice, but half of it turned into a treatise on the 'using' statement (which in and of itself is worth listening to).

I normally don't listen to podcasts because I learn faster by reading, and I don't spend a lot of time in cars typically (unless on travel). Because my Zune makes it so easy to subscribe to podcasts, I have started subscribing with it. That way, when I am traveling, I have a ton load of content to listen to as I drive.